From commentor Sarah in Brooklyn:
When our cat Louie died, I wanted another cat right away. Louie’s pal, Max, was sad, and I hated having only one cat. I called one of Brooklyn’s cat rescuers (aka crazy cat lady), who said she had a kitten. We went out to her place, which was surprisingly sane considering that she had many, many, many cats and some dogs there. In one of her cat rooms were a lot of adult cats. It was a swirling mass of cat bodies, but I looked down and this little grey kitten was looking up at me, and it was all over.
__
That was about 5 years ago. Strummer and Max have never gotten along well, but I adore him. He’s a secret love cat – most of the time he’s stand-offish, but he gets under the covers with me at night, curls up against my belly and purrs like a steam engine. He’ll sleep like that for hours, with his head on my arm. He’s also a champion jumper, as you can see from the picture (full disclosure: he can’t jump from the floor to the top of the door, but he goes from floor to bookcase to door with great ease). He’s an intelligent and mysterious cat, and I feel honored that he actually likes to spend time with me. He also has a really impressive set of whiskers.
Bruce S
Just a reminder – We Are One! solidarity with Wisconsin & other public employees rallies today:
http://local.we-r-1.org/
Check out your local area for activities.
stuckinred
Nice kitty’s!
MeDrewNotYou
I love agile cats. Turn your back for one moment and they’re staring down at you from the top of the bookshelf. Here’s a Straight Dope article about climbing cats that are also (forgive me) scaredy-cats.
Two things strike me about Strummer. First are his eyes. They’re beautiful and creepy and awesome all at the same time. The second is his balance. Balancing on the top of a door is the kind of thing that should get him in the Kitty Cirque du Soleil.
HeartlandLiberal
As a Hoosier, I am really enjoying March madness right now. Butler in the men’s final, and Notre Dame in the women’s. Maybe there is a $DEITY after all! Here’s hoping both Indiana teams take home the championship honors this year.
In the case of Butler, I am just glad to see a team that does NOT represent the gross takeover by money and broadcast industries of the college sports industry, reach this level. Coached by a coach that seems to be the genuine article, not the slick cheating grifters and con artists that have come to infest the sport nationwide in major programs. I won’t name any names, but I will point out that Indiana is just north of Kentucky, which team’s loss was most satisfying, and will readily tell you I just retired from Indiana University, where Kelvin Sampson’s actions pretty much destroyed the men’s basketball program to the point Tom Crean is having to rebuild totally from scratch. I like Tom, but here is hoping this next year’s season shows a majority of wins. Fans are not willing to wait any longer, especially when they look an hour’s drive north and see the Butler coach taking a team to the championship game two unbelievable years in a row with raw coaching skill and kids who represent the best, including one who is the top academic award winning student nationwide. Howard’s family was sent to the Final Four compliments of a fund raised by the town where Howard’s data is a postman. A true and touching heartland tale of family and community support.
As for the cats meme du jour, last night we had to close the cat tunnel to the outside in the lower level wall, and keep all three of our indoor/outdoor cats in overnight. We have an intact feral male who is stalking our neighborhood. He has injured one of our neutered tom’s so badly in past two months that we had to drain and treat two bad abscesses. Two nights ago, we were awakened by our same male and the intruder locked in battle on our main deck. Even when both of us went out on the deck with a pitcher of water, it took pouring the water on the intruder and pushing him with the plastic jug to get him to appreciate he was not welcome and break up the fight with our cat.
Bottom line, it is time to break out my live trap used in the past to reduce the overpopulation of racoons in the neighborhood through a relocation program to the nearby national forest. My wife has already contacted a local rep of the feral capture/neuter/release program. I cannot have this feral animal, which is extremely aggressive, even to humans it comes into contact with, attacking our cats. I feel sorry for the cat, it is not getting any treatment for injuries it may have suffered, and no vaccinations to protect against parasites and disease, and thus becomes a vector for spreading those, as well as suffering itself.
One of our three cats is a two year old neutered male we got from the shelter, who has taken a LOT of love and care to adjust to the idea he is safe in our household, and he does not have to fear being abused or hurt by anyone anymore, as he was as a kitten. This feral cat’s most recent night of attacks has left poor Spenser, our cat, spending most of the day Sunday hiding under our bed in terror. Not a good thing.
Lysana
Strummer is a beautiful cat. I’m assuming his name is based on the late great Joe?
Phyllis
Love the juxtoposition of the relaxed kittie in the Adrenaline shoe box.
Sarah in Brooklyn
Thanks for praising Strummer! I love him! He is indeed named after Joe. He is a never-ending source of surprise and pleasure.
kay
@Bruce S:
Thank you. I actually found one I can attend (I think).
They should hold them at 5, not 4.
I can’t go to these things so early.
Linda M
@Phyllis:
And the all the kitty chew marks on the box lid. Such a beautiful boy!
Ash Can
@Linda M: Those chew marks cracked me up too. What a sweet kitty.
mr. whipple
Awesome cat! Well done, Sarah!
Josie
Pretty kitty! And such expressive eyes. I love cats and boxes.
debit
What a lovely cat.
gogol's wife
Those pictures are both of the same cat, right? He’s adorable. Love the whiskers in the second picture. They’re out and proud.
Tom
A Brooklynite with a cat named Strummer… ladies and gentleman, we may have a genuine hipster on our hands.
WereBear
I love “secret love cat.”
Hey… you’ve got to hide your love away…
Just Some Fuckhead
Who has the giant feet?
Mary G
What a gorgeous boy! I love “secret love-cat.”
Poopyman
“Intelligent and mysterious”.
The very best kind of cat.
Paul in KY
Really handsome cat. Love the picture of him in the shoe box.
Poopyman
@WereBear: Lily does the same thing with me, particularly in cold weather. She’ll nose her way under the covers, circle, flop, and knead. My chest looks like I’ve got chicken pox from November to April.
ThresherK
@MeDrewNotYou: One agile cat, in a house with two, is enough for us. Two agile cats out of two can get nerve-wracking.
Love photos of cats in the process of reshaping boxes to fit their own bodies.
Derek
It amazes me that so many people still consider cat declawing to prevent things like this. I’d be proud to have my cat walk on my door. I’d encourage it, in fact.
matryoshka
I want a kitty, but we have 2 dogs, and I worry about mutiny in a house where the 4-leggers outnumber the 2-leggers. It’s nice to be able to adore your super-handsome kitty from afar!
trixie larue
We have two cats that we took in at different times. Sam was the agile one in our house. His favorite thing was to run through the house, up and down the stairs, leaping from the landing, with one stop on the floor and crashing onto the window sill. Niki just could not keep up. Sam is now dying from cancer. I miss him already. Niki, who hates physical contact, sleeps on my lap all day. Niki also is a box deconstructionist. I’d love to get another kitty but Niki is very territorial. I took her in for past life regression analysis. She was a doberman in a previous life and before that she was Joan Crawford…
asiangrrlMN
Strummer is such a handsome and adventurous boy, Sarah!
Jay C
@ThresherK:
Hear you about the “agile cat” thing: we just (4 weeks ago) got a new kitten (Himalayan) as Cat #3: Our Jeremy (Cat #2) is an amazing jumper: we were SO pleased when he took to liking his new baby sister – they are, of course, now BFFs – except that he now chases her around the apartment at high speed, and at all hours (usually the wee small ones!), and, we think, is training/encouraging her to be a jumper as well.
Good thing they’re so cute…
ThresherK
@Jay C: They will continue to be so cute, and when they grow up you will look at them and see those innocent little kittens to whom jumping onto the couch cushion was an accomplishment. They know this. You will therefore forgive them for jumping onto the top of the china closet and knocking ceramic tea knickknackery to the floor.
(No, I don’t have kids, and I don’t fill my parenting hole with my cats. Not at all.)
Amanda
Strummer sounds very much like my tuxedo cat, who is black and white, but who also does the standoffish/occasional snuggle thing and is also very graceful/agile and has very dramatic whiskers. I wonder if it’s a tuxedo thing?
Great pics and lovely story — thanks for sharing!